Tesla VP Says Adaptive Headlights Are Coming to North America Soon

Tesla launched its adaptive headlights for vehicles with matrix headlights in software update 2024.2. However, the launch excluded North America, where the regulations for adaptive headlights differ from those in Europe.

While Transport Canada has approved adaptive headlight use since 2018, NHTSA has lagged behind considerably, with regulation approval only coming last year. While other manufacturers like Rivian have already launched adaptive headlights in the United States, Tesla is still working on their implementation. The good news is that it looks like Tesla is finally close to completing its implementation of the feature and all recent vehicles will be supported in a software update soon.

Lars Moravy, VP of Vehicle Engineering at Tesla, confirmed on X that adaptive headlight functionality is around the corner for North America. Tesla has already added some changes for matrix headlights with update 2024.20 in North America, but the changes are very subtle.

Matrix headlights are able to independently control their LEDs to adapt to the light distribution pattern based on traffic conditions and road curvature. That means you can selectively brighten, dim, activate, or deactivate specific pixels in the matrix array to form dark or light areas in the headlight pattern.

Effectively, you can have perfect high beams while not dazzling drivers or pedestrians in front of your vehicle. Essentially, as oncoming traffic or traffic ahead of you is recognized, the matrix array will track them and blot out the light that would be landing on their vehicle.

To check if your Tesla has matrix headlights, examine the outer edge of the headlight. If there’s a prominent, round projector dome (see the image below), your headlights are likely matrix. If this dome is absent, you have standard, non-matrix headlights.

Another way to confirm is to run a stock light show while parked facing a wall; if the Tesla logo appears in letters, matrix headlights are installed. In general, all Teslas produced after January 2023 come with matrix headlights, while models built between December 2021 and early 2023 may have them, depending on the availability of parts and your region.

Tesla has been developing support for adaptive headlights for North America for some time now. Lars has commented on Tesla’s work on bringing the feature to North America before, but his latest “almost there” comment suggests Tesla is close to releasing the feature. Lars’ previous comment on matrix headlight support was in March of this year, where it complimented the work of the Tesla team in rolling it out to Europe and said that more regions and features will follow as Tesla gets the necessary certifications.

Tesla has various headlight designs, and the implementation could be different depending on the model, so not all models may receive support at the same time. Given Tesla’s most popular vehicles, we may see this added to the Model 3 and Model Y before the Model S, Model X, and the new Model 3.

The addition of adaptive headlights is a huge safety feature and one that will also have a positive effect on safety ratings, so expect Tesla to prioritize this feature over others. Given the timing, we may even see this as part of Tesla’s upcoming holiday update.

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